


Wandering Blind

by SomedayTheSky



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Chara's Pronouns are They/Them, Communication, Cuddles, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family, Fluff, Frisk's Pronouns are They/Them, Home, Other, Running Away, Self-Esteem Issues, grammar is important to me just thought you should know
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-01
Updated: 2017-07-01
Packaged: 2018-11-21 18:52:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11363499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SomedayTheSky/pseuds/SomedayTheSky
Summary: Frisk knows that Chara is a good person. Chara is too caught up in the past to believe them.When Chara chooses to run away from home, Frisk decides to tag along in the hopes of changing Chara's mind about themselves and their decision to leave their family. What starts as friendly concern quickly escalates into romantic interest. As much as Chara wants to accept these new feelings, how can they when they know they don't deserve to? And how is Frisk supposed to cope with Chara's instinct to push the ones they love away?





	Wandering Blind

**Author's Note:**

> Also published under my wattpad, @SomedayTheSky. Enjoy!

Wandering Blind

 

“Chara?” I pant, breathless from running down the stairs. I thought I heard movement by the front door, and it had woken me up. Only one person could be up this late, and there could only be one thing they are doing. _I don’t want to be right. Please don’t let me be right._ There’s Chara, standing in front of the doorway clutching their backpack by its wide straps. “Where-?” I don’t even know how to begin. They had spoke about running away before, but I never thought they would really do it. “Where are you going?”

They hug their black patent leather jacket around their waist and bite their lip like they always do when they’re about to lie. “Um… Taco Bell?” they try.

“Taco Bell with your bag at two in the morning,” I scoff. Their hand is already resting on the doorknob. I can see them itching to pull it open and make a run for it. “You’re actually leaving tonight? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Tell you about… Taco Bell?” they swallow hard.

I want to scream. I want to throw my hands into the air and yell for Mom, Sans, _somebody else_ to solve this. But no, there’s only me, always me, constantly standing between Chara and their self-destructive habits.

They let their hands drop to their sides. “I’m sorry,” they say, reading the anger on my face.

“Sorry for running away, or sorry for getting caught?”

Chara steps back, hugging their waist again. I can see the greenish collar of their sweater peeking out underneath their jacket, and I can’t help but think of Toriel knitting it, of Mom. She gave us everything, payed for this apartment, offered Chara mercy, forgiveness. A second chance. This is how they respond, by ditching town?

I’m glad my words have stung them. _They deserve it_ , something shriveled and small and evil in my brain says. _They killed everyone. They deserve so much worse._ The rest of my brain, the good, benevolent part that people think is who I am, wants to apologize, wants to work things out, knows that Chara is different now. Better.

“I have to go. It’s the only way everyone will be safe,” they say, their voice trembling.

“Us? What about _you_ ? You have no money, nowhere to go. How will you survive?” I already know the answer- Chara doesn’t care about their own survival. I breathe deeply. Calm down, _calm down._ “Okay,” I say, as authoritatively as I can, “If you’re going, I’m coming with you.” This way I can watch out for them, eventually get them back home.

Chara is struck by some wave of emotion, though what it is, I can’t tell. Their eyebrows furrow and their jaw slackens a little bit- sort of a mixture of confusion and surprise. “You’re coming?” they say, their voice still shaky. “You’re not telling Toriel?”

“You would just hate me and then try to run off again.”

“I couldn’t ever hate you,” they interrupt me, “not since the new world _._ You’re the one who hates me, now.”

That hits me, and hard. _Frisk the merciful,_ everyone says. _Frisk the kind._ I don’t hate Chara. It’s more that I care about them too much. That’s what makes me worry about them, what makes me say rash things when they’re about to get themselves killed- things that sometimes hurt them.

“I’m sorry, I don’t mean that.” Chara takes it all back quickly. Always the first to apologize. “Hurry, let’s get your stuff.”

 

* * *

 

 

The first thing is the pierce of light, like the dusky world is a mass of blue fabric, and someone ripped a hole of starlight in it. Then the noise, the _clack-clack_ of the wheels spinning rhythmically down the track, the train’s mechanical heartbeat. The steam, the wail of the horn, louder and closer, until finally it’s here; it’s right in front of us, and we have to _jump._

“How do we do this?” I ask Chara, trying to hide my nerves by putting on too exaggerated a mask of courage.

“Run alongside it to gain momentum. Throw ourselves onto the back of one of the storage cars, where there’s a small place to sit.”

“Shame it’s not like the movies, where the doors are wide open.”

“Shame,” they agree.

And just like that, we’re back to normal. Our usual banter, no talk of hating each other or any such nonsense. We’re friends. We have been ever since… Well. We don’t talk about Chara’s past, the world that came before this one. But everyone remembers it. We remember the death, and the dust that filled the air, and the soullessness of their old smile, their knife, the screams. The wind whistling through blackness, nothing, nonexistence.

But that was the old world. This is the new world, where monsters and humans live in peace, where only sunlight fills the air, not dust and wind, inky blackness.

I was the only one who would talk to Chara for a long time. I had nothing to lose, I thought, if they killed me. I could just load a save point, and it would be like it never happened. No danger. I hadn’t yet realized that I had lost my power to save and load. It doesn’t matter anyway. I don’t want to reload anymore. Life now- humans and monsters, harmony- is perfect.

Maybe the perfection of this life changed Chara somehow. In the old world, they were soulless, cruel. Now they are witty, and quiet, and even kind in their odd way.

The train is whistling by fast, blowing my hair wildly around my face. If we’re going to jump, we need to do it now.

Chara starts running ahead of me, and I follow behind them, searching for places on the back of the car that I can grab onto to hoist myself up. The train isn’t far from the ground at all, only a few feet. It should be easy.

_Easy,_ I laugh to myself. Like this is anything but terrifying.

Suddenly and noiselessly, Chara leaps through the air and grabs onto a handle attached to the back of the car. They make it look so easy, so effortless, I can’t help but wonder if they’ve done this before, and why they’ve done this before. They swing their legs onto the platform and grin at me proudly. Just like that.

Maybe I was wrong. Maybe it’s _me_ who can’t survive on my own.

I imagine mimicking their motion. An easy leap, a grab of the handle, a swing of my legs, and I would be on.

_Oh god, what if I miss?_

I decide to take three more big strides and propel myself through the air with as much force as I can muster.

_One, two, thr-_ Something scuffs the toe of my shoe the instant I launch myself from the ground. This isn’t right. _This isn’t right!_ I feel myself tilting in the air, lurching too far forward, not high enough. I hear myself scream, and all I see is a blur of Chara’s panicked face before realizing that I’m going to fall on top of the train tracks, and be crushed, and that will be the end of it. I squeeze my eyes shut. I don’t want to feel the impact of the train, of my bones getting crushed to dust. I don’t fear the pain of dying- I’ve gone through it countless times- but it’s not like I enjoy it, either. I reach for my save file- but it’s not there. I can’t save. I forgot that I lost my power to save.

This is final. This is it. This is the end of my life, the real end of my life.

_Dead. I’m going to die. I am actually going to die, and not come back, and not exist._

Something clasps my hand, warm and calloused, and my waist, too, and pulls me over the ledge, where we collapse on top of each other.

“Holy crap!” Chara says emphatically, still holding onto me like I might topple over. “Holy! Crap! Holy! Actual! Crap!”

It occurs to me that this is the first time I’ve heard them curse. It’s such a silly, light thought, that this person who once single-handedly brought about the apocalypse doesn’t curse. I laugh and laugh, and I can’t stop laughing, feeling weak and oddly limp with joy. _I’m alive!_ _I’m alive!_

“Frisk?” they say, their face still contorted with panic.

_I’m alive!_ “You saved my life, Chara.” I don’t mean to make it sound so damsel-in-distress-y, so cliché, but it does, and I don’t even care. _Chara_. Chara saved me. I abhor that ugly part of my brain, the one that calls them evil.

It’s only when they release me and scoot away that I realize how close we were just then, how unguarded, falling all over each other. It felt right, it felt natural. I hadn’t needed to notice it. It just was.

Chara curls into a little self-contained ball and hugs their knees. “I can’t,” they say simply. Back in their shell.

I know them well enough to understand, just by this. They feel like they can’t be called a hero, a saver of lives, after everything they’ve done.

“Hey,” I say gently, trying to coax them back out, “whatever you might have done in the past, you just saved me right now.” I catch their eyes, which are beginning to water. “Nobody is entirely good, you know. We all do things that are guided by selfishness, or greed, or just misanthropy. Things we regret. Heroes are the ones that don’t let those things define them, that try to do good anyway. And… you try to do good. I don’t know. What I’m trying to say is thank you.”

They smile feebly at me and then press the palms of their hands into their eyes. “Sorry,” they say, sniffing, “I’m a little pathetic. I just… If you’d died just then…” their voice cracks.

Chara is crying because they’re worried about me. _Chara_. I think that is many things, and none of them are pathetic. I stretch out my fingertips to place my hand on their upper back, slowly so that they can move away if they don’t want me to touch them.

It dawns on me then- we’ve never touched before today. Not even casual hugs, or like- _handshakes_. Suddenly the brief moment of intimacy from before feels… profound. Were we just in shock from my near-death experience? Did it actually mean something?

“Chara,” I retract my hand, trying not to observe their reaction. Do they want me to touch them? Do they not? For some reason, it makes me feel nervous to know. “Do you have-?” I want to ask, but how do I do it without the inevitable implication of _I want to touch you_? “Uh, this question is probably going to sound a little creepy.”

“My favorite kind of question,” they wipe off the last of their tears.

“Okay,” I exhale, shaking off more random nerves. “Um… What are your boundaries?” I try. “Physically- I mean- with- uh… me touching you.” _Ouch_. I could not have put that in a more awkward way.

“Oh.” Chara’s shoulders sag.

_Look, you made it weird._ “It’s not a big deal,” I try to save face, “Just me being strange. It doesn’t matter.” Heat rises to my cheeks. _Nonononono, stop being dumb, Frisk._

“No, it does matter,” they say with surprising conviction. “If we’re going to trust each other, you should know.” They pause, milling it over in their head. “Are you familiar with Homer’s _The Odyssey?_ ”

Of course Chara would explain it this way. “I’m not.”

“Well, it’s an ancient greek poem about a guy called Odysseus sailing home on a boat. Essentially.” They laugh a moment at their oversimplification. “In this one part, he has to sail past these creatures called sirens. The sirens sing so beautifully that any sailor who hears their songs throws himself overboard so that he can be closer to them, and drowns in the waves. Odysseus has his crew tie him to a mast when they pass the sirens so that he won’t jump overboard, and that’s how he survives.” They search my face, seeing if I understand.

“So,” I muse, “you’re Odysseus, metaphorically speaking. And by running away you’re… tying yourself to the mast, is that right? The sirens are everyone you know, and jumping overboard and dying is like… turning into old world you.”

They nod. “That’s why I’m running away. There’s no chance that I’ll hurt them if we’re hundreds of miles apart.”

“Chara,” I say. I want to tell them that they’re wrong, that I know they’re a good person now, a changed person.

They won’t hear it. “The metaphor-” they make a show of cutting me off, “as it applies to physical contact is similar. The siren song is beautiful but… it leads Odysseus to his death.” They’re still staring at me intensely, trying to make me understand.

“What do you… Could you mean-?” I think I understand, but I hope that I don’t. I hope that I’m wrong.

They look away suddenly, staring at the ground, at the front of the train car behind us, everything cloaked in dusky sky-fabric. Sometimes you can see it on Chara’s face- you can tell they’ve gone into that nightmare space in their head, reserved only for death, war, suffering, all the horrors they brought about once upon a time. It’s like they’re fighting a constant war in their head, the old versus the new, the evil things and the good things, all deciding what Chara thinks of themselves.

“I’m afraid,” they whisper, “that if I have someone in my arms, all vulnerable like that-“ they clamp their hand over their mouth and shut their eyes tight, like they’re trying to keep the words from spilling out. “I’ll hurt them.”

And just like that, the truth comes out. The whole ugly thing. “Here’s one,” they say, still squeezing their eyes closed, “Icarus and the sun, and I’m the sun, and I’m Icarus.”

I don’t ask what they mean- I don’t want to break the spell of truth. I feel like I’m witnessing a secret Chara, like I’m inside their head. It makes me sad, that this is what they think of themselves. They’re more- they’re much more, but I don’t know how to make them believe that.

“That’s why I don’t let people touch me. I mean, not many people want to in the first place. The way they look at me- like I’m filth, like I’m dangerous- the things they _say_ … And how much it hurts to know it’s all true, it’s all entirely warranted. I don’t deserve people’s intimacy. It’s too _pure_ for me. It’s too good.” they finish, their hand clamped tight over their mouth still.

“Have you,” I say, at a loss for words at being entrusted with this personal of an insecurity. “That’s- Have you talked to anyone else about this?”

Chara nods. “My therapist helps me a lot. But it’s still- it feels like such a personal thing, you know?” They open their eyes and let their hand fall.

They should be crying, but they’re not. They seem more in shock at having told this secret out loud. How long have they been rolling this same garbage through their head, actually believing it? As long as I’ve known them in the new world. Probably longer.

“Well,” I say, suddenly determined, “what makes you so certain that I, for one, would just roll over and die if you tried to hurt me? I’m not- I don’t know, I’m not a _flower._ I can stand up for myself.”

“Frisk,” they warn. “I’ve destroyed… literally the entire world. It’s not about how strong you are, it’s how much you want it.”

“You _don’t_ want it,” I argue. “You’re in control of yourself, and you don’t want to hurt me. You don’t want to hurt anyone.”

They pause, considering me. “You’re arguing like- Do you _want_ to touch me?” They don’t mean it seriously. They mean it to cut me down, a sarcastic, scathing remark. Because they believe themselves to be unforgivable, unlovable, undeserving. _How could anyone want that_ , their eyes say.

But… I do want that.

So I scoot closer and wrap my arms around them. Hesitantly, gently. We had fallen together weakly before, messy and gleeful with life and miracles and existence. Everything now is careful, observed. They sit with their legs stretched in front of them, no longer curled up. Guarded, but not quite. I rest my head on their shoulder. _They haven’t moved away from me._ I suddenly feel like I’ve been filled up with something shiny and golden.

Chara is not soft, not by any means. They are muscled and calloused by war from the old world, the end of the old world. Like a soldier. _They are this way because they killed people._ The thought should repulse me, make me want to cringe away from them. But it doesn’t, and I don’t.

They aren’t beautiful or handsome in the traditional sense. They might have been once, if there was ever a time when they were innocent. Now, scars criss cross their body- mostly from Sans, and also Undyne- a small one tracing from their ear to their nose, a gash on their shoulder, the side of their leg. And those are just the ones I’ve seen. Their face, though, is striking. Dark, almond shaped, deep set eyes, contrasting with light skin. A hidden smile. Features that once were severe and brutal now seen as interesting and unique through the new light of the soul inside.

I feel them shift. _No_ , I think, an odd sense of dread pervading through me.

“Chara,” I say softly, preparing to apologize. _I should have let them be._

“Frisk,” they reply, almost- _fondly_.

That’s when they put their arms around me. If I was hesitant before, they are now, tenfold, like I might vanish, or collapse into a pile of dust.

Piles of dust are the farthest thing from my mind.

Chara is warm, and perfect in that unnamable way that some people are, and they smell like peppermint, like fresh ground coffee.

And everything feels…

_Right._

 

* * *

 

 

Eventually, the blue fabric falls away, and the world is sunlight. I blink my eyes against it and bury my head in Chara’s shoulder.

_Chara’s shoulder._

It’s then that I remember where I am, and with whom, and what we’re doing, and I feel strangely like dancing, or shouting with joy from the top of a mountain- _“I’m the ruler of the world!”_

Chara feels me shift and pulls me closer to them. We must have moved during the night. Now I’m sitting on their lap- _their lap!-_ with my legs curled up, their arms around me in a misinterpretable protective gesture, their jacket draped over my back.

Of course I can protect myself. I always have. But- I like this. I like them. I feel safe.

I give them a hug and don’t let go.

“Are you awake, Frisk?” they whisper.

Meaning that I must have done stuff like this in my sleep for the question to be at all relevant. Oh _,_ man _._ “Yeah,” I whisper back, and then, “so you didn’t murder me in my sleep.” Heat rises to my cheeks, more than was already there. That was a stupid attempt at a joke, making fun of their deepest insecurities. What if they take it the wrong way?

They laugh, and I can breathe again. “Far from it, it would seem.”

I can’t think of what to say, so I just sit there, trying to memorize this feeling, this morning, the way the sun glints against the metal tracks.

I finally lift my head from their shoulder and look them in the eye- a considerably harder feat than it was yesterday. Their face is flushed with color and so, so, happy.

I want to trace their scar with my index finger- the one from their ear to their nose- but can I?

Am I brave enough? _Kind of._ Would they let me? _Obviously._ Is it worth it? _Only one way to find out._

So I do it, starting at their ear and tracing the faint line across their jawbone, their cheek, then up to their nose, which I give a little tap.

They giggle. _Giggle. The former destroyer of the world is giggling because I touched their nose._ It’s a surprisingly pure sound, light and clean.

“Thank you,” they say, grabbing my hand from their face.

“For… for what?”

“For proving me wrong. For showing me I’m not who I think I am. For… giving me this moment.”

“Anytime.” _Damn it, why do I always make it weird?_

Chara giggles at me for the second time ever, squeezing my hand.

_This is the hand they once used to hold their knife._

_No, this is the hand that pulled me onto the train._

They guide our joined hands to my ear, tuck back a strand of hair. The reverence with which they do it makes me feel like my hair was the equivalent of their scar- something they had always wanted to touch, but were never brave enough to.

I am floating in a dream world until they pull me down.

“I’m- I’m taking you home, Frisk.” Their face grows instantly more sober, their eyes fog over a bit.

“What? Wait, _what?_ ”

“It was reckless of me to bring you along in the first place. I mean, you almost died.”

“You saved me! I’m alive because of _you_!”

“You deserve better than this. You deserve your family.”

“So do you! So does anybody! I thought we just- you didn’t hurt me! You won’t hurt them! There’s no reason to run away anymore!”

“Frisk.” They are begging me, and it hurts, and it hurts to know that this is who they are, that they will push me away over and over again and never realize how much it stings.

“No. You know what, no.” I wrench my hand from theirs before I can think about what I’m doing, untangle myself from them. “No!” I don’t mean to shout, but I do. “People _love_ you, Chara. I fucking love you! But if you can’t get your shit together long enough to realize it, then I am certainly not going to waste my time trying to show you. I’m done, okay? You clearly don’t want me around, so I’ll do you a favor and leave. Talk to me once you’ve realized what a mistake you’ve made.”

I always, always, protect myself first.

I stand up, gripping the handle on the train car. We’re approaching a town, passing a station. A convenient place to jump off. I can pay for a ticket back home with the little money I brought.

“Frisk.” It comes out as almost a whimper this time.

_Don’t look back,_ I tell myself. _Don’t look at them._ But I can’t help it.

I instantly regret it. They’re clutching their jacket in their fingers, tears damp on their cheeks. Their eyes- those striking, weary eyes- have turned bloodshot. They stand up. “I’m coming with you.” Chara clenches their jaw. They are determined. They want this.

I don’t know how to feel. I gave them an ultimatum, and I hadn’t expected them to pick my side. But they did. They chose me over the insecurities they have fostered for years.

“Chara?”

“No,” they snap. “Don’t forgive me. Don’t forgive me until I make it right. Just let me come with you.”

And with that, we jump onto the station platform.

 

* * *

 

 

The passenger train, with its upholstered airplane seats and its too-bright fluorescent lighting, is nothing like the train we came on, our train.

We sit next to each other, and we don’t speak, or touch, or look at each other for too long, and it kills me. I’d prefer crying or yelling to this newfound steely quiet, this sterileness.

I don’t know if we’re playing that game that couples sometimes play, where the person who apologizes first is the loser. But Chara won’t apologize until they feel like they can accept forgiveness, and whatever they’re planning to do to atone for this, they haven’t done it yet.

“Chara,” I finally say. Their name is still doing an odd sing-songy thing in my brain.

They have been looking out the window for the past hour to avoid this moment, when they’ll have to turn their head and look at me. I catch their eyes.

We’re holding each other’s gazes, and that’s a start.

I realize that I don’t know what to say to them now. I just wanted something to happen. I could apologize. My little jeremiad was mean, but it was true, and it was enough to get them to come home with me. So I’m not sorry.

“One of us has to say something now,” they comment, a smile teasing at their lips.

“I guess so,” I say, weirdly relieved. They’re smiling. They don’t hate me. I think of our conversation before we left, and shame hits me like a brick. _I couldn’t ever hate you. You’re the one who hates me, now._ “We’re not… This isn’t the end of us, is it?”

“That depends,” they sigh, “on whether you want it to be.”

“No,” I interject, perhaps too quickly. “I mean, I know that we- whatever we are- have barely even properly started. We both did some dumb things. But I don’t want it to be over, not this soon. Is that…” I pause, scared of the answer. “Is that okay? Can we… I don’t know... see where this is going?”

They smile at me, their face softening. “Yes. _Yes._ It’s more than okay.”

We reach for each other’s hands at the same time, lace our fingers through each other’s at the same time. Tension flows out of me, and I have that same sensation of my blood being made of liquid gold, of being able to breathe again.

“Let’s not do shortsighted things or yell at each other ever again,” I propose.

“Sounds good,” they smile, running their thumb back and forth over the back of my hand. They pause for a second. “Did you mean what you said to me back there?”

I wish I could say I didn’t, wish I could just smooth over the rough patch like it was never there, just a mistake, nothing truthful about it. But that would be a lie. “I did,” I say, keeping a tight hold on their hand, hoping they won’t pull away from me like I did from them.

“All of it?” They aren’t angry, though, they’re- bashful?

“Sure. I can’t remember half of it, though. I was obviously very worked up.”

“Oh,” they smile, and leave it at that.

What the hell could I have said that would cause them to react like this?

 

* * *

 

 

“This is more difficult than I thought it would be,” Chara says, clinging with one hand to me and one hand to the doorknob.

“I’m right here.” I squeeze them gently in an attempt to be reassuring.

“What is she going to think about me after I’ve run off like this? What is she going to think about _you_ , running after me? What will she say about us being together? I mean, she calls us her _children_. We’re obviously not on very sibling-like terms-”

“She calls everyone she meets her children, it’s not like it means anything.”

“-and both of us being _theys_ and not a _she_ and a _he_ -”

“Chara. She’ll love and accept us a pair of _theys_ just as much as two individual ones.”

“What if she won’t take me back? What if she won’t take _you_ back because of me?”

“ _Chara_.” I pivot them around to face me and put my hands on their shoulders. “It’s okay. You and I, we’re going to be fine.”

I look hard into their eyes, trying to steady them. They brush my arms with their fingertips and turn around.

But the knob turns on its own, the door opens on its creaky hinges. A moment of silence, a moment of delight.

There she is.

_Toriel._

_Oh god, I’ve missed her._

She scoops us up in a huge, skeleton-crushing hug. Nobody says anything, nothing needs to be said. We hold hands, and she ruffles our hair and grins, and we smile, the world is smiles.

 

_It’s okay._

_You and I,_

_We’re going to be_

_Fine._

 

* * *

 

 

An Epilogue ~ Chara

 

Every morning since I came home, Frisk has been outside my door, waiting with a hug and a kiss and a cup of tea for us, and it is perfect. They are perfect.

I’m glad to be home.

I used to think that if I ran away, I could save them.

But if you run away from the people you love, you are not going anywhere, doing anything, saving anyone.

You are only wandering blind.

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
